Character Clues

Character Analysis

Names

Names are supposed to be something you're proud of, but in this book, names are sometimes kept hidden because the characters aren't proud of them. Take M.C.'s name for example. He's supposed to be called "Mayo Cornelius Higgins" (1.1), but you get the sense that he's just not into his—let's face it—pretty strange name. In fairness, he is named after a condiment.

This explains why he prefers to go by M.C., but remember—he's not just M.C., he's M.C. the Great. At least, that's what he calls himself until he meets Lurhetta Outlaw. He introduces himself by saying, "They call me M.C. Higgins, the Great'" (7.144), but when she more or less mocks him by saying "M.C., what?" (8.1), he just calls himself "M.C. Higgins" (8.2). He learns to drop the Great really quickly when he realizes she just isn't all that impressed with him.

That's because Lurhetta can see past names to the character of the person. Although that doesn't mean she isn't, like M.C., also ashamed of her name. In fact, she doesn't even say what her name is until the Higgins family pull it out of her. She lets Jones know that it's because of her last name, Outlaw, which makes her feel uncomfortable about who she is.

But this book is a coming-of-age novel and part of that process is learning to come into one's name, which Jones help Lurhetta do:

"I'm not asking you nothing about your background," Jones was saying, "but it seems to me 'Outlaw' can mean more than a single thing. It can just as soon mean your people got no protection from the law, so they was outside it, so to say. Way back when, how many black folks had any luck with law, anyhow?"

The girl's eyes were round and wide. "Sure, it could mean that," she said. "My mother once knew this teacher from New York Manhattan who said the New York Manhattan telephone book was full of Outlaw names. Said they all lived in Harlem, Manhattan, too." (10.23-24)

Names carry history and stories to them. Sometimes, if they're kind of fake, like "M.C. Higgins, the Great," they need to be abandoned (which he does at the end of the book). But other times, they need to be embraced, as Lurhetta finally does after meeting the Higgins and the Killburns. As Jones points out, with a name like Lurhetta Outlaw, "There has to be a story in there" (10.25). And we suspect that, for once, Jones is completely right.

Props

M.C. has his pole. That's his thing, and it gives him power because it shows how strong and independent he is. After all, he wins it as a prize from Jones after he swims across the Ohio River. Plus, the thing is really tall with a bicycle on top of it that only M.C. can ride:

It was forty feet of glistening, cold steel, the best kind of ride.

M.C. gazed up at its sparkling height. There was a bicycle seat fixed at the top. He had put it there himself and had attached pedals and two tricycle wheels below it on either side. (1.186-187)

For more on the pole, hop on over to the "Symbolism" section. There's a whole lot to dig into when it comes to our main man and his main prop.

Lurhetta is also defined by a prop—her knife. However, unlike M.C.'s way with knives (he kills rabbits with them), Lurhetta uses the knife only in self-defense (and not even all that well). She doesn't even like getting her knife bloody, as she points out when M.C. uses her knife to kill a rabbit, saying, "One minute, [the rabbit is] alive and the next […] you got my knife all bloody" (11.95). The knife is Lurhetta's companion for self-protection as she travels alone through the woods, and she's not pleased when it gets used in a way that she'd never use it for.

Maybe that's why she's able to give up the knife to M.C. at the end: It's a prop that doesn't really fit her character in the end since she just isn't into it's full purpose, which involves hurting and killing.

M.C. also gives up his prop at the end—in fact, he "forg[ets] even to glance at it" (14.55) as he works with the other kids to build the wall. Moreover, he moves and builds the wall with the dirt and trash that hold up his pole. The book never tells us that the pole is coming down, but we can guess that it will without all that junk holding it up. Plus, he tells us that he's saying "Good-by, M.C., the Great" (14.236)—a sure sign that his character has undergone a huge shift, one that won't need a huge pole to define it anymore.

Speech and Dialogue

Speech and dialogue show who's in and who's out. Like this conversation between Lurhetta and M.C. and his family, when Lurhetta criticizes how Jones acts toward the Killburn icemen:

"Treat other people like that," she said, "like they were dirt."

She looked disgustedly at M.C. as though he had done something to hurt her. But he knew she was talking about Jones. Sounding like some stranger.

"You saw them. Not just 'other people,'" M.C. said, defending Jones. (10.118-121)

See what we mean? Lurhetta dares to speak out loud about how bigoted the M.C.'s father is and that's a big no-no. And in her willingness to do so, we're shown that she's an outsider.

Meanwhile, M.C. and his family speak the language of the Appalachians. That doesn't only mean little quirks in the language, like saying "why come" (3.159) instead of just why. It also means using yodeling as a form of communication. Here's how Banina communicates with her kids as she's coming home from work:

His mother leaned back, cupping her hands around her mouth. A yodel cry like no other filled the air.

For a moment there was no sound other than that voice of hers which seemed to fall from the sky: "Yad d'looka—M.C.—alodaaah…" It started low, with breath enough for a long, hard line: "O-leay-aMama-home-alo. May-alay, alay-a-Macie-o-alaeu." The voice went up the scale with perfect lightness and control.

"Mama!" Macie Pearl screamed. "I see you! Mama, Mama, alay-alaeu." (4.136-138)

Yodeling isn't exactly the standard way talking to another person… unless, of course, you're Appalachian.

Thoughts and Opinions

Sometimes when you get to hear a character's thoughts and opinions, they give you a solid idea of what the world is like and how other characters are. Not necessarily so in this case though. Since the book comes mostly from M.C.'s perspective, we get his thoughts and opinions, but those thoughts aren't stable or simple.

Instead, M.C.'s thoughts and opinions change as he matures, and they show his inner conflicts more than anything else. Like the way he views the Killburns. M.C. can, on one page, think in his head toward a Killburn man "Witchy, kill you. Burn you at the stake" (12.185)—a thought we can all probably agree isn't exactly pleasant. But then, one page later, M.C. can think this:

He would have liked to stay awhile up there, where all seemed fresh with growing and sun.

Except for the witches. Were they witchies? What he had seen of them made him ponder a moment. Mrs. Killburn, just as nice. Even Mr. Killburn, not so bad if you didn't look at his hands or watch his eyes as he handled the green-grass.

What he had just seen and what he had known for so long about Killburns mixed in disorder in his mind. He sighed. (12.191-193)

See what we mean? M.C.'s thoughts and opinions show him thinking through his values and growing up. For this reason, we can't expect them to stay constant—they're too busy showing us our main character's growth.